A 400-page report released by the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health and Safety confirms that LED lights cause almost irreversible damage to our eyes. LED lights may lead to macular degeneration and blindness.
Officials need to revise the maximum limit for exposure to LED lights which emit blue light. LED lighting is 90 percent more efficient than incandescent light bulbs. It’s cheaper and dominates half of the lighting market. The production will increase up to 60 percent by 2020.
The damaging effects of blue lights
Blue light causes photoreceptor damage, leading to vision loss. It causes phototoxicity, a condition in which damaged eye and skin cells are more sensitive to light than normal cells.
LED lights may cause irreversible damage to retinal cells and vision loss. Eye cells die, and this triggers the development of macular degeneration. It’s a leading cause of vision loss in the US, and more than 10 million Americans.
These lights are everywhere – in homes, streets, offices, industrial environments. They are even used in car headlights and toys.
Smartphones and electronic devices
The blue light in your laptop and phones disturbs sleep and blocks the absorption of melatonin. Chronic exposure to low-intensity LED lights is less dangerous, but it leads to aging of the retinal tissue and vision issues over time which is the same danger brought by high-intensity LED lights.
Blue light causes extensive damage
LED lights affect the production of melatonin and worsens diabetes, heart disease and some cancers.
This light affects cancers that are triggered by hormone disruptions, such as breast and prostate cancer. Blue light disturbs hormones related to sleep. It penetrates skin and leads ti premature aging and wrinkles. Even limited exposure to this type of light disturbs the circadian rhythm and sleep.
Risk groups
Elderly and children are more susceptible to eye damage than individuals in other groups. Kids’ lenses aren’t fully formed, and these lights may cause even greater damage and sleep deprivation.
Prevent the damage
— Choose the lighting carefully: Buy warm white LED lights, and avoid lights with a bluish shade. Their color temperature below 3000K
— Limit your exposure and avoid LED screens before going to bed
— Use software to reduce the exposure to blue light: It filters blue light and adjusts lighting conditions on your devices in accordance with your circadian rhythm
— Be careful when using blue-light filtering products: Their efficacy isn’t proven
— Eat colorful veggies rich in zeaxanthin, lutein and astaxanthin (sweet potatoes and acorn squash or butternut squash); Wild-caught salmon, shrimp and algae have red pigments.
